I have over 46 newspaper articles on one ancestor

First of all, I would say, newspaper research can be very time consuming.  It is not for the faint of heart.  It takes more than a few attempts at obituary indices to find real success.  I have literally collected droves of newspaper articles on family members.  I love newspaper articles because they fill in so many details that have been lost to our memories.  During times when I thought there may not even be one solitary piece of evidence of an ancestor's life, I have been brought to my knees so to speak, turning the microfilm reader page by page in a desperate search.

I have noticed that most of the newspapers I need to access either have not been digitized; others I have free home access to through my local library.  So, I either need to physically sit in the library until my eyes blur, or I stay up for hours at night searching. I find have more success when it is quiet, and I am not distracted.  Hence there have been many times I have wanted to turn and nudge my sleeping husband out of the desire to have company while I celebrate.  That is a hard one to resist. Poor husband!  

Obituary indices are a good way to get your feet wet and build confidence in newspapers.  If you delve deeper though, you learn so much more.  I have actually pieced together the whereabouts of a few of my ancestors year by year in between the censuses, and I have not even exhausted all the available issues in two different papers, The State, and The Palmetto Leader published in one area where they were living.

Those of you who have African ancestry, do not assume that only African American newspapers documented your family.  I have found just as many articles mentioning my ancestors in The State paper in the 1920's to 1950's as I have found in The Palmetto Leader, an African American newspaper.  I would not have found so many articles had I not decided to look beyond the obituary index and search each page of each issue.

I have documented

• employment
• school events
• church activities
• sale of farm equipment
• residential addresses
• and more!

Historic newspapers are so much fun to look through because you find so much more detail about people and events that took place.  I have learned so much about my great grandfather, Lafayette Franklin Vance (1861-1952).  I have found him mentioned in over 46 articles from 1926 to 1952! When I hold those photo copies, they feel like pure gold!

Newspaper findings, Robin Foster.

I love this one line in an August 25, 1928 article that appeared in The Palmetto Leader:

"The Presiding Elder Dr. L. F. Vance was very fatherly in his disposition and wise in his counsels."

I am certain he would have been someone that I would have been very fond of judging from the descriptions that appear in the articles I have discovered so far.  This just makes me want to continue the search even more! 

I published the article above entitled, Ten tips for more success with newspaper research.  I have had so much success learning about my family from historic newspapers.  Be sure to enter your e-mail above to receive the next article on Saving Stories!

Read Full Story...

Approximating Parent's and Death from Child's Delayed Birth Record

Approximating a parent's death from the child's delayed birth record probably sounds pretty incredible, but in the search to document the birth's of the children of Julius and Frances Chick Talley, that is exactly what the delayed birth record for Sagasta McConnell Talley enabled me to do.

Frances was living to be a witness

I was also very fortunate that Frances who was born about 1875 was living to validate her son's birth in 1941.  I had documented this family in Union County, South Carolina, on censuses 1910 and 1920. They moved to Fayette County, Pennsylvania sometime after 1930. I was not able to find them on the 1940 Census until now because I had no clue where they were living.

I wanted to find documentation of my great uncle, Julius, and Frances and I was hoping that a delayed birth certificate on one of their children would reveal where the family had moved to.  Frances' maiden name is Chick, the same surname as some of my maternal ancestors.  Even though she is related by marriage, I am curious about who her parents are and if we are related in some way.

"South Carolina Delayed Births, 1766-1900 and City of Charleston, South Carolina Births, 1877-1901," images, Ancestry.com  [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2007. Original data: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina. (https://search.ancestrylibrary.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?indiv=1&db=SCbirths&h=2443 : accessed 11 Dec 2013).

Frances, Martha, and Hasco in 1940
Sagasta applied for a delayed birth certificate while living in New Jersey in 1941. Even though I have not located him yet on the 1940 Census, I searched the 1940 Census and found Frances (widowed) living with Ulysses and Martha Gill in Jersey City, New Jersey. Martha was one of the six remaining living children out of 13 total on the 1910 Census.  She must have been named after my 2nd great grandmother and mother to Uncle Julius. Also in the household was Frances' son, Hasco.

"United States Census, 1940," index and images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/K4B3-HLV : accessed 06 Jan 2014), Frances Tally in household of Ulysses Gill, Ward 8, Jersey City, Jersey City, Hudson, New Jersey, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) 24-208, sheet 61B, family , NARA digital publication of T627, roll 2407.

From there I also discovered what I think is the Social Security Death Index for Frances who lived to the age of 94 (May 1969), however, this will need to be confirmed.  I am hoping this will reveal who her parents are.

Along with Sagasta's mother being a witness on the delayed birth certificate, a woman named Gertrude Sims of Union County also verified information about his birth. Sims is another ancestral name on my maternal side. 

Cousin fun on Facebook 

I could not find a death record for Julius.  Amazingly, my cousin Rolanda has also felt inspired to search for more information on this family. She is a great researcher, and has always been able to find things I did not know. Even though she is asking if I knew anything about Hasco C. Talley who I discovered living in Newark, she reveals that members of this family lived in New York. Ten years between censuses can cause you to miss important information like that. I am excited that she has also found the name of Hasco's wife and their burial site. She even shared the dates of his enlistment in the army.  I know she would have eventually looked in the 1940 Census for Hasco.  I am just glad she asked me so that we could put all of this together. What fun!

I wonder if Julius is buried there?  I cannot really go by the age at last birthday on the delayed death certificate because it says Julius was 42 when he died.  I know that cannot be true because I found him when he was 53 years old on the 1930 Census.  So we need to figure out if Julius died in New York (if he even lived there) or New Jersey.

So many clues are coming to the surface that I will need to review each one individually.  I am finally pleasantly overwhelmed by all the information accessible through historical records online. I cannot weight until Rolanda weighs in on this.  At any rate, I do not think it is a coincidence that Rolanda has been researching the same branch of the family at the same time and also asked me about Hasco whom I just discovered.  We have been searching this family for over 15 years. Something tells me she is about to discover living cousins. 

Read Full Story...